Thursday, June 30, 2016

Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin has threatened to reverse expanded Medicaid here if federal officials reject his proposed reforms, but federal law does not allow him to follow through on his threat. The interesting wrinkle is the feds don't want to call his bluff now because they are still trying to trap more Republican governors like those in Arizona, Florida and Ohio in the Medicaid expansion roach motel.

That is, "you can check in, but you can't check out."

Senator Rand Paul should file a bill to explicitly give states the right to reverse acceptance of Medicaid expansion and start campaigning for this right away. Such a bill would pass the House and Senate and force Obama and Hillary Clinton to either confirm the trap ObamaCare puts states in or to reverse it.

Either way, freedom is advanced.

"The more people learn about ObamaCare, the more they understand the disaster it is," Kentucky Progress publisher David Adams said. "Obama and Hillary need to decide if they want to go down fighting for power most Americans won't want them to keep."

Today is a big fundraising deadline for the presidential race, so the generic email request for money I got is not a surprise. But I would like to state publicly why I won't respond positively to this one.

"With your help today," the email reads, "we can turn our great country around and Make American Great Again. We can secure our borders, create jobs and keep our families safe."

Making America Great Again is an effective campaign slogan for lots of people, as is leading with policy proposals to attack illegal immigration, spur economic activity and pursue a strong national defense, especially since Hillary Clinton's campaign appears focused on raising taxes, matching small dollar campaign contributions with tax dollars, abortion and "strengthening regulation of 'puppy mills.'"

Nevertheless, the campaign I want to support would seek to restore greatness by getting government out of commerce and out of education and out of the wealth redistribution business. Donald Trump will get plenty of votes and lots of campaign contributions being slightly better than Hillary Clinton. But I'm not investing a dime in slightly better than Hillary Clinton.

Sunday, June 26, 2016

A political sea change appears underway in Frankfort which could be very bad news for Kentucky Democrat operatives accustomed to ruling the roost.

It seems the largest voting block in Franklin County, Democrat state employees, appreciates Gov. Matt Bevin's keen interest in reversing the Gov. Steve Beshear policy of using public pension money to pay off political cronies. They also like the competence of Bevin political appointees, which represents another dramatic shift from the prior administration.

This could prove to be very bad news for the eager but inept Attorney General Andy "Baby" Beshear and we should know that pretty soon.

"The person to watch is Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd," Kentucky Progress publisher David Adams said. "The last time he ruled on a governor's reorganization powers, he had no problem ignoring the law for ObamaCare to benefit a Democrat governor because his own Franklin County constituents were pro-ObamaCare. I think his constituents want Gov. Bevin treated fairly on KRS 12.028 in the University of Louisville Board of Trustees case which would involve Judge Shepherd following a law he abused the last time it came in front of him. If Gov. Bevin wins his U of L case in Franklin Circuit Court, things start to look very bad for Democrat operatives Baby Beshear and Greg Stumbo."

Saturday, June 25, 2016

Nine months ago, Attorney General Jack Conway urged Gov. Steve Beshear to reorganize the University of Louisville Board of Trustees, suggesting an "executive reorganization under KRS 12.028." (OAG 15-015) Current Attorney General Andy "Baby" Beshear is now suing Gov. Matt Bevin for reorganizing the University of Louisville Board of Trustees through an executive reorganization under KRS 12.028.

You couldn't make this stuff up.

"One must wonder if Gov. Beshear would have twisted so many arms raising money for Baby Beshear if Baby sued him for doing the same thing for which he is now suing Gov. Bevin," Kentucky Progress publisher David Adams said. "These guys are such a clown show. Expecting Stumbo and friends to stage a sit-in any day now to demand Bevin stop cleaning up pension corruption."

Tuesday, June 21, 2016

The U.S. House Appropriations Committee will take up Homeland Security funding Wednesday, which would include continuing to pour money into a national identification and tracking program called REAL ID. Committee Chairman Hal Rogers should heed the call of Kentuckians to end the charade and drop further funding for REAL ID.

"Big government types claim forcing Americans to carry a federal ID card will somehow make us safer but they are never specific about how it accomplishes that because it doesn't," Kentucky Progress publisher David Adams said. "Hal Rogers needs to get on the right side of this or explain in detail why he won't."

Monday, June 13, 2016

Federal drug warriors at the DEA are being dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century as Congress warms to the idea of allowing Veterans Administration doctors to prescribe marijuana for their patients.

"Marijuana has been deemed a 'Schedule 1' drug by the feds, meaning that it has no medicinal value and only hurts people but we know that isn't true and already half of states have enacted medical marijuana laws to reflect reality," Kentucky Progress publisher David Adams said. "They could keep it illegal but call it 'Schedule 2,' allowing medical research for things like epilepsy and multiple sclerosis where we have seen benefits and the DEA has already conceded they may do that this summer."

Saturday, June 11, 2016

Hillary Clinton has spelled out on her campaign website plans to reboot ObamaCare which may explain why the left-wing establishment media has been so quiet recently about the mess that health reform has become.

She wants to pretend that it's 2010 all over again by resetting and expanding federal bribes to states to entice them all to accept Medicaid expansion. She wants to spend billions of dollars to paper over two of the most visible problems with ObamaCare: high premiums and unaffordable deductibles. She wants to increase by $500 million a year marketing expenses to advertise ObamaCare at everyone, expand coverage subsidies to everyone regardless of immigration status and restart the public option "cooperatives" back to the beginning with more money.

"Now we know why the mainstream media has gone suddenly deaf and dumb to all things ObamaCare," Kentucky Progress publisher David Adams said. "Hillary Clinton's big idea for healthcare is to start all over with much more money and more federal control as if no one has learned anything from the massive failures of the last six years of ObamaCare experience."

Tuesday, June 07, 2016

Gov. Matt Bevin got kudos in a Forbes Magazine article today for shutting down Kynect and seeking to limit ObamaCare's damage to the best of his ability while the Associated Press reports Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell doesn't want to withhold ObamaCare funds from Obamacrats across the country.

"ObamaCare is taxing and spending now solely because congressional Republicans allow it to persist and there is simply no good reason for it," Kentucky Progress publisher David Adams said. "Gov. Bevin deserves credit for keeping his campaign promise and Sen. McConnell deserves to have language from the United States Constitution Article 1, section 9, clause 7 tatooed backwards across his forehead so he can see it in his bathroom mirror every day."

"The language chosen by Judge Shepherd more closely resembles the remarks of a partisan, political operative yammering on incessantly on the 24/7 cable news cycle than a respected member of the bench," Goettl said in his complaint filed with the Kentucky Judicial Conduct Commission, which Goettl asked to issue a public reprimand of Judge Shepherd.

In his complaint, Goettl compared Shepherd's actions to those of former Attorney General Greg Stumbo in his attacks against former Governor Ernie Fletcher.

"Judge Shepherd's remarks seem to fit that political strategy, whether he intended them to or not, in that they fed the Democratic narrative and the news cycle of a news organization whose editors openly oppose Governor Bevin."

The Lexington Herald Leader published an Associated Press article about Shepherd's remarks under the headline: "Judge: Bevin's executive order is like a 'neutron bomb'."

"The Frankfort spin machine runs like this all the time," Kentucky Progress publisher David Adams said. "The difference this time is Jessamine's County Attorney Brian Goettl is protecting the public and the rule of law better than this rogue judge and these leftist reporters who didn't see any bombs going off when Gov. Beshear abused his executive order authority four times to saddle us all with his ObamaCare mess."